I think all of this talk about Jaylen’s BB IQ is premature. He’s not Tatum, of course. But compare him to other young and past Celtics and he comes out looking pretty good. He’s starting in Avery Bradley’s old spot, and he’s leaps and bounds ahead of where AB was as a second year player. You’d like to see better touch around the basket from Jaylen, for sure, but it took Bradley years to develop that, and it took an older Terry Rozier into his 3rd year to start making progress there. Recently, Jaylen seems to be adding “drive and hit the open man” to his game.
Statistically, there hasn’t been a huge leap forward in Jaylen’s rate stats (other than shooting better from three), but the modest improvement he’s made in those has come along with a shift in role from bench player to 30+ Minute starter.
I think we need to continue to watch his development. I kind of think right now that he’s going to be a future max player - so his career downside is probably “lesser max guy”, which is pretty damned good.